Pitch Pearl Origins
by CyanPluto
Summary: AU: Danny Fenton and Danny Phantom were never the same person. Phantom is an entity formed from Danny at the moment of the accident. This results in Danny acquiring ghostly traits (ghost sense, ghost speak) and Phantom acquiring human traits (sleeping, eating, etc). Now the friends must learn to manage with their new ghost companion. Pitch/Pearl, M/M, casual paced plot.
1. Chapter 1 - Origins

_Trapped._

That was the first sensation the ghost remembered: the feeling of being trapped. He had the vague feeling he had existed before that, like the ghost of the ghost zone itself. Like a presence always there, giving you the feeling you were being watched. A conscious unconsciousness.

But now he was trapped. Bound to a single form. Torso, head, arms, hands. He wasn't sure how he knew that but he _did._ His mind struggled to push beyond the boundaries of his form, to break free, but he was trapped. And every inch of him ached with the sensation of existence.

As the blinding light receded, the ghost was bombarded by other sensations until he thought his head would explode. Touch, sight, sound, smell—it was all too much. The ghost's brain began shutting off his senses to focus on one at a time.

 _Sight._

He looked down at his hands. _His hands._ The thought was new and yet familiar. He stared at them as they glowed eerily beneath the gloves he didn't recall putting on. Ten fingers, two hands.

Ectoplasm swirled beneath his skin, threatening to break free but unable to. The ghost flexed his fingers as he floated in the glowing green room. Suddenly his thoughts were interrupted by a scream.

 _Sound._

It was more like a yell than a scream, and it was full of terror. The yell echoed off the walls of the chamber, overwhelming the already dazed ghost. He flung his hands over his ears trying to drown out the piercing sound. His eyes clenched shut as his head throbbed. The sound surrounded him, panicked him. The eyes he had shut snapped open as he searched for the source of the scream. It didn't take long to find it.

 _Sight._

The green glow that had been so intense before had faded as the ghost became accustomed to it. Now he saw an oddly familiar boy several feet from him. The boy's hands were raised and shaking with terror as he stared wide-eyed at the ghost crouched by the floor. His face was distorted in the scream he let out. Before the sound even stopped echoing the black-haired boy took off in a run towards the exit of the passageway.

If the ghost had known how to scream he would have too. His new-found senses were being overpowered by his environment and he hovered, hands still over his ears, in a corner of the glowing room. But something about the boy had excited his curiosity. He had been too familiar, pulling at memories the ghost didn't know he had.

And so the ghost rose, tail curling behind him as he floated after the boy as if in a trance. As he approached the swirling doorway, other sounds met his ears. Voices that were familiar, but whose words were undecipherable. Yells, clamors, gasps. _Words._ Yes, he could almost make them out, if he just strained a little harder.

The ghost passed through the door of the portal and entered a room of grey walls and metal tables. _Basement_. _Lab_. The words floated to his mind as easily as he floated above the floor, but the ghost wasn't sure where the words came from. He gazed around the room, eyes catching the movement of the boy from earlier. Then two other movements, two people. One was racing for a table with strange devices on it, the other was backing away from the ghost, hands clenched in front of its face. But it was the boy in the white suit from earlier who captured his attention.

The ghost hovered toward the boy who backed away in terror, stumbling over chairs in the process. In his attempt to escape, the human slipped and fell on his back. He threw his hands in front of his face in one last attempt to protect himself from the ghost.

 _Those hands._

The ghost stopped advancing, but continued to hover above the boy. His eyes locked onto the human's hands, which shook with fear along with the rest of the boy's body. The ghost peered with intense curiosity at the black gloves the boy wore and the hands beneath them. Lifting his own hands he noticed just how similar they were. Nearly identical, if not for the white gloves on his.

In one swift motion the ghost boy grabbed the outstretched hand of the human on the floor and pulled it close to his face.

 _Touch._

The feeling was instantaneous. Warmth coursed from the human's hand to his own fingers, filling a need he didn't know he had. The black-haired boy let out another yell and tried to pull away, but the ghost held firm. He was amazed at the feeling of touch, the feeling of clutching the boy's hand. It was heavier than expected, much heavier than the ghost's own body, which defied gravity. And it pulsed with life. Although the heartbeat was faint through the gloves, it was rapid and fierce with the terror rising in the human.

"Danny!" a voice yelled from behind. _That's right,_ though the ghost. He looked down at the human beneath him, recognition slowly increasing. Memories faded in and out of the ghost's mind, memories he knew were not his own. Playing with his sister Jazz, researching planets online, putting on the white hazmat suit at Sam's request, cautiously entering the ghost portal, and then—

"Get away from him!" Sam yelled out. A whirring, squealing sound rang out and the ghost turned just in time to see a blast of energy shooting toward him.

 _Pain._

He hadn't been fast enough to evade it. The blast seared into him, burning him, sending his senses screaming. He slammed against the wall behind him and slumped onto the table. Ectoplasm began dripping from the wound in his shoulder. It wasn't a bad wound—Sam had been thrown off by the unexpected recoil of the gun—but the feeling of such intense pain was new to him. Sam took aim again, and the ghost felt panic rise up in him, urging his body to action. Before Sam could pull the trigger, the ghost vanished.

He wasn't sure how he had done it, and he definitely wasn't sure how to _un_ do it. But somehow he was safe. And invisible. He winced at the wound Sam had inflicted, making a mental note to steer clear of his parent's weapons in the future. No, _Fenton's_ parent's weapons.

Before he could question too hard at the implications of that, he remembered Danny sprawled out on the floor. Invisibly, he snuck down from the table and floated toward the boy, holding his shoulder with care as he moved. Sam and Tucker had already rushed to Danny's side and were helping him to his feet.

"What _was_ that? Are you okay?!" Tucker asked. His voice pitched from the fear he had felt just moments before.

"I'm not sure," he responded. "And…" A chill ran down Danny Fenton's spine. The room was so cold he could see his own breath. "I'm also not sure."

Danny struggled to stand but as he did a wave of nausea swept over him. He steadied himself in a nearby chair.

"That _thing_ was definitely a ghost," Sam said, answering Tucker's question. "It didn't hurt you did it? Why was it in your face like that?"

The ghost boy hovered closer to the trio, understanding more and more of their conversation. Danny shivered again before responding. "No I…I don't think so," he flexed the hand that the ghost had grabbed. "It didn't hurt me, but I feel…sore all over. And sick, like my whole body's been turned inside out."

"You're lucky you weren't killed!" Sam continued. "We saw the light and heard you scream and…" she trailed off. "We weren't sure what to think for a second there."

Danny let out a shaky laugh, his breath rising in the cold. He wasn't so sure he _hadn't_ been killed. Sam hadn't seen the ghost as clearly as he had when it came after him. Even in his terror, Danny didn't miss the eerie similarity. Except for a few changes in color, the face that peered down at him menacingly had been his own.

Danny wasn't the only one who thought this. As the spirit hovered invisibly beside them, the gears in his head were also turning. But nothing made sense. Memories from before the portal swirled around him, both human and ghost memories. What _was_ he?

The mirror by the sink at the far end of the room caught the ghost's attention. He floated toward it, the conversation between the three friends fading to the background. As he approached the mirror, he struggled to become visible again, afraid of what he would see, afraid of what he wouldn't. He pulled at an energy deep inside him, willing himself into visibility.

And then there he was. He wasn't sure what he had expected, but this certainly wasn't it. The face that blinked back from the mirror did indeed resemble Danny's, but that was about where the similarities ended. The ghost's eyes widened as he reached up to touch the glass, cool and smooth beneath his fingers. White hair, piercing green eyes, tanned skin. And his whole body was giving off an otherworldly glow. The ghost boy gave a weak smile to his reflection. _Not bad._ Not what he was expecting, but not bad. He was…concerned that he looked so human, though, because every inch of him screamed—

"Ghost!" yelled a trio of voices behind him.

 _Oops._


	2. Chapter 2 - Studying

It was late summer. Danny Fenton and his ghost counterpart were leaning back to back cross-legged on the floor. The air conditioner downstairs was doing nothing for Danny's sweltering bedroom. The boys had toyed with the idea of having the window open or closed, but the heat from outside was even more intense than the heat caused by Danny's computer, and they quickly opted for a closed window. A small fan circulated the steaming air around the small space.

Today, though, Danny didn't even feel the heat—he had his own personal air conditioner. He smirked to himself as he pressed against the ghost boy's icy back, watching his cold breath mix with the air. Danny was busy working on his first homework of the school year, while Phantom was trying unsuccessfully to read a book. It didn't help that the human was pressed so close to him, his warmth seeping into Phantom's very core.

It had been nearly two weeks since the accident, when Phantom had floated out of the ghost portal after Danny, only to be shot by Sam. So far Danny had successfully hidden the ghost from his parents, and they were even getting into a routine, a sense of normalcy. If you could call befriending a ghost who looked nearly identical to you "normal".

But Phantom knew it couldn't last. He had been enjoying his nights of fighting crime and exploring the city, and could finally roam Amity Park without getting lost (the first day he ventured outside FentonWorks he had found himself at a coffee shop with no idea how to get back). But it was these moments with Danny that were most taxing on him. Everything about Danny sent the ghost into confusion—his smell, his voice, the feeling of his warmth pressed against him. He had tried to keep a safe distance from the human, not wanting Danny to become suspicious of his feelings for him.

Today, however, Danny had insisted on using Phantom as a personal ice box in order to keep cool. The ghost boy obliged…but as Danny leaned against him with more force, he began to regret his decision.

Danny let out a frustrated sigh as he realized he had been using the wrong formula in his math problem. Kicking his textbook away he arched his back and playfully pushed Phantom farther to the floor. "How can anyone _think_ in this heat? Let's play Doomed instead!" Danny suggested, looking up at the ceiling as his breath rose above him.

Phantom, now feeling squished and uncomfortable, realized he had read the same sentence four times. _Ugh._ Didn't this human know the effect he had on him?

To get back at the human for practically trying to rub his face in the carpet, Phantom quickly turned intangible and let Danny fall to the floor. The result was more than he could hope for. Danny let out a yelp of surprise as his means of support seemingly disappeared, leaving him crashing to the ground. His back and head contacted the floor with a loud thud.

"Hey! What was that for?" Danny whined, rubbing the back of his head, trying to hide a smile. Danny knew he had deserved it.

Phantom closed his eyes and let out a victorious laugh. Upon opening them, though, he quickly fell silent. There was Fenton, sprawled out beneath him, rubbing the back of his head with a sly grin on his face. Phantom became acutely aware of their proximity to each other and of how Fenton's sweat made his shirt cling to his chest. Looking down he realized his hands were intangible in Danny's torso. In fact, if it weren't for his intangibility, he would be sitting in the human's lap.

A green blush burned the ghost boy's face as he hastily floated up into the air. His legs morphed into a tail and he gave the human more space. Danny gave the ghost a quizzical stare, oblivious to his friend's torment. "What's up, man?"

Phantom struggled to regain composure. "Uh I…was thinking of doing some patrolling in the ghost zone. I think the heat is getting to me too." He hoped his increasing blush wasn't obvious. "But Doomed sounds fun, you should ask Tucker to join, get your mind off school."

Phantom floated towards the door and was about to turn invisible when he remarked, "When I get back though, I can see if I can help with the homework." With that, he sunk into the floor towards the basement, turning invisible in case the Fentons were downstairs.

Danny remained where he had fallen, still massaging the bruise on his head, throwing a confused look in the direction Phantom had vanished.


	3. Chapter 3 - Friends

"Sorry Tucker, I don't think the PDA thing is gonna work," Phantom admitted with disappointment. He tossed the device to the teen. "I have no place to put it when I'm fighting. I had to hide it in a corner today when Skulker showed up, hoping it didn't get stolen or stepped on in the meantime. I wish I knew how Technus conjured up objects out of nowhere," the ghost said in frustration.

"Bummer man," Tucker responded. "I was hoping it'd be a cool way to communicate in case a ghost showed up during school." After a pause Tucker stopped walking mid-step. "Wait a minute! You left my baby lying in a corner unsupervised?!" The human clutched his spare PDA to his chest in mock horror.

Sam and Danny rolled their eyes. "I couldn't carry it around in the middle of a battle," Phantom argued in defense. "I need both hands to fight!"

The four friends were walking home after another long day of school. Correction, _three_ friends walked, one ghost boy levitated above them as they made their way down the deserted street. While the humans had been at school, he had been protecting Amity Park from yet another ghost attack, this time from the infamous Skulker. As much as the humans wanted to get in on the action, any more missed class would mean a call to their parents, and none of the teens wanted that. So the friends had fallen into the routine of letting Phantom battle ghosts solo during school hours, the humans pitching in extra fire-power once class was dismissed.

Today had been relatively calm. Skulker was the only ghost to make an appearance, and Phantom now had the enemy safely contained in the thermos strapped to his waist.

"Maybe you should get a backpack," Danny suggested, continuing the conversation as they walked/floated. "I think I have an extra one you could borrow in a box of old school supplies."

Sam sneered. "Yeah, from like fifth grade! Wasn't that from your Superman phase?" she joked, elbowing Danny in the side.

"Superman is a classic," Danny contended. "And come on, Phantom's practically a superhero anyway." The human gestured both arms up at their ghostly companion. "It kind of fits."

Phantom laughed sheepishly. "I don't know about _that._ Plus wouldn't your parents get suspicious if they saw the ghost boy flying around wearing your old backpack?"

Danny shook his head. "Naw there's gotta be dozens of those things, you could argue it belongs to anyone. And I bet they've forgotten all about it by now."

Sam eyed the ghost hovering in the air. "I don't know, I think a bright red and blue backpack would throw off his image. He needs something edgy to strike fear in his enemies. And it would probably make maneuvering in battle a lot harder."

"Exactly!" the ghost boy agreed, then quickly flashed invisible as a woman in yoga pants jogged toward them. The teens remained silent until she had passed them by, the only sound being their collective footsteps. When she turned the corner Phantom rematerialized.

"I don't know about the whole edgy comment though," Phantom said, picking up the conversation where they left off. "If I'm going to add anything to the outfit I was thinking a cape. Really cement that superhero vibe."

"A cape doesn't make you a superhero, you know," Danny commented. "Plasmius _also_ has a cape."

"Hashtag Not All Capes," Tucker responded.

The four teens burst into laughter. Danny glanced up at his ghostly counterpart. He was glad Phantom was fitting in. It had been a rocky start for sure, and it didn't help that the Fenton's had raised Danny with the thought that ghosts were evil and frightening. While this seemed to hold true for most ghosts the friends encountered, Phantom couldn't be farther from the stereotype, and they had quickly adopted the specter as the fourth member of their small group.

Danny's mind wandered to the problem of the PDA and how the friends could communicate to keep ghosts at bay while Phantom flew about the city.

"What if we sewed pockets into your jumpsuit?" he suggested.

It took a moment for the other friends to follow his train of thought. Phantom looked down at Fenton skeptically.

"You know how to sew pockets?"

"I know my way around home ec," Danny said proudly. "It was either that or intramural sports, and I'm not exactly the athletic type."

"Hey, you're not half bad at dodgeball," Tucker retorted.

"That's cause I get lots of practice running away from Dash," Danny grimaced. He turned his gaze up to the ghost floating above them. "But yeah, lend me the jumpsuit later and I should be able to work in some pockets." He paused. "No wait, I think my parents had it special ordered online. I don't have any fabric for it." He sighed, blowing at his black bangs and frowning in thought. The teens soon reached the fork in the path that designated they would have to separate to their own homes.

Sam spoke up. "I could lend you some," she offered with a smile. "I have a bunch of black material left over from a macabre skirt I was making. I can bring it over after dinner."

"Perfect!" Phantom said enthusiastically. "I was hoping you and Tucker could come over to Fenton's house anyway, I wanted to show you the new lairs in the ghost zone I mapped out."

In no time plans were made and each friend went their separate way, ready to ask their parents for permission to go to Danny's for a "study session" later that night.


	4. Chapter 4 - Pockets

Sam and Tucker knocked on the door which lay under the towering FentonWorks sign. As usual, the teens opened the door without waiting for a response, having already established Danny's house as their second home.

"Hey Mr. and Mrs. F," Sam called to the two adults in the living room. "We're just going to be in Danny's room working on that very important homework project I'm sure he's told you about. No need to get up, we know the way."

"It could take hours really," Tucker threw in. "Don't bother checking on us, you wouldn't want to throw off our concentration. You know how important it is for kids to stay focused." Sam elbowed him as they climbed the staircase to their friend's bedroom.

Pausing at Danny's door, Tucker knocked. "Bff's barging in," he announced. Before the accident he and Sam would have waltzed in without a thought, but with Phantom in the house they all decided it best to give a warning so they wouldn't freak out the young ghost. In a house full of ghost hunters, one could never be too careful.

Sure enough, opening the door they found two boys studying on the floor, one of whom was giving off a faint glow and floating ever so slightly. He looked up and smiled.

"Hey guys," Danny said, closing his English textbook. His breath floated to the ceiling as he spoke. Phantom had been helping him with homework, trying to explain to the human what on earth a quatrain of poetry was. Danny welcomed the excuse for a break. "You bring the fabric, Sam?"

The girl swung her backpack off and rummaged through its contents. "I don't have any spandex but I've got some fantastic leather." She pulled out a wad of jet-black material. "And here's some cotton and nylon stuff too." No one was surprised that the other fabrics were also entirely black.

Danny felt each material thoughtfully. "That should be good." He stood and pulled an old box of sewing supplies from the back of his closet. "Phantom, toss me the jumpsuit and I'll see what I can do."

The ghost boy tried unsuccessfully to phase out of the black and white outfit. Every time he turned intangible the clothing came with him. His frustration grew and after several attempts he sighed, opting for the mortal method. He fumbled with the zipper, rubber gloves making it hard to grasp the small object, but soon he was able to unzip the jumpsuit down to his waist and shrug it off his shoulders.

Sam cocked an eyebrow and suppressed a grin. It was remarkable how much the ghost truly _did_ resemble Danny. His now bare chest was tanner than his human counterpart's and even without the jumpsuit his skin continued to glow—but his slender physique was otherwise identical to Danny Fenton's.

Phantom blushed under the gaze of the three onlooking teens. He glanced down at the remainder of the jumpsuit which he had yet to unzip, and instantly vanished from sight.

Tucker laughed. "What, too shy? It's not like Danny and I don't have gym together every day. We can always kick Sam out into the hall." In response Sam pushed Tucker onto the floor.

" _I'm_ not Fenton," came a reply from an unseen source. "We may look the same, but don't you forget we're different." The voice that spoke was full of agitation. Danny, Sam, and Tucker exchanged a wary glance.

Two white rubber boots came into visibility and flopped onto the floor. It was surreal how they continued to glow despite Phantom taking them off. If Danny didn't know any better, he would swear the glow they emitted turned a shade of ghostly green.

Next the black jumpsuit sank to the floor as it too returned to visibility. Danny picked it up and ran the material through his fingers, deciding which of Sam's fabrics to use for a pocket. He turned the jumpsuit inside out and began to work.

The dresser drawer at the side of his bed opened seemingly by itself, and a pair of jeans levitated in the air.

"Hey!" Danny protested. "Stop messing with my stuff."

"Chill dude," came the response from the dresser. "I'm just borrowing them. Unless you don't think they'll fit me." The three friends could hear the sarcasm practically drip from Phantom's mouth.

"Whatever," Danny said rolling his eyes. He began measuring off lengths of morbidly black nylon fabric. The jeans that had been floating in the air disappeared as Phantom pulled them over his invisible legs. Then a black t-shirt floated out of the dresser and the ghost flashed into sight, back turned to them.

Two of the teens on the floor couldn't help but notice Phantom's bare skin as he slipped his arms into the sleeves. The third teen was on his PDA and hadn't even noticed Phantom regain visibility. The specter pulled the shirt over his head and ruffled out the wrinkles, but before he did two pairs of eyes caught the bruises on his back from his battles, the way his ghostly glow rippled around him like a living entity, the way the jeans he wore failed to hide his polka dot boxers—

"Ow!" exclaimed Danny, clutching his finger. Sam turned to him in surprise, and Phantom glanced behind his back. "I'm fine, I just pricked myself with the needle. No harm done."


	5. Chapter 5 - Late

"Uggh."

"You can say that again."

" _Uggghhh_."

"Ok man chill, you're making me depressed," Tucker said, putting a sympathetic hand on Danny's shoulder.

"I can't help it, that test was brutal. How am I supposed to remember that much about the New Deal? I'll never make it into college."

"Don't you kind of have to to be an astronaut?"

"Shut up Sam," Danny said in playful irritation.

"Dude, you know they aren't sending astronauts to space anymore right?"

" _Shut up Tuck_ ," Danny yelled in denial, giving his friend a noogie.

"Hey, watch the hat," Tucker protested. Sam leaned against her bike and shook her head. How did she end up friends with these dorks?

The sky was murky and overcast, but the three friends were still lounging outside a block away from school in an abandoned lot no one visited. This was where they usually met Phantom after school so they could walk home together and he could update them on any spectral activity. And today he was late.

The solitary girl of the group kicked at a patch of dead grass with her combat boots. "Maybe you should text him," she suggested, playing the pronoun game.

"Huh?" Danny asked, but realized who she meant before the word even left his mouth. "It wouldn't hurt I suppose. It hasn't been that long though. He probably got distracted by some new amazing thing in the ghost zone and lost track of time."

Sam nodded absently. To be honest, Danny was worried too. Phantom had never been late before. It wasn't that the ghost boy couldn't hold his own, and there were certainly any _number_ of things that could hold him up, Danny knew he shouldn't be concerned. It's not like there was a pause button for a ghost fight so he could swing by and catch up with his friends. Hero duty didn't revolve around their school schedule.

But _still._ With the Fenton's being ghost hunters and with even more powerful ghosts appearing every day, Phantom could get seriously hurt. How would his friends know where he was if he needed help?

Danny sent out a quick "school's out, everything ok?" text to the PDA Phantom kept with him, trying to sound nonchalant in case he was just overreacting. Then they waited. Clouds rolled by as the wind picked up, and Sam pulled her jacket out of her backpack.

"Want to run to the comic store later today?" Tucker suggested, trying to start a conversation.

"Not really," Danny replied. Worrying about their ghost friend had stripped away any good mood they might have been in. "I have a lot of homework tonight. And if that last test taught me anything it's that I need better study skills." Danny stared down at his phone. No reply. There was no way he'd be able to focus on homework if Phantom didn't get in touch with them soon. Not to mention, he always did homework _with_ Phantom, and having to sit in his empty room would just make his anxiety worse.

Half an hour passed. Then forty-five minutes. Danny pulled out his phone and dialed the number for Phantom's device. After several rings the call went to voicemail. Danny hung up.

"Well," he said after a moment, "I guess his phone's not dead."

Tucker resisted the urge to make a dead joke because _come on, dead phone, dead ghost, amIright?_ but decided this wasn't the time.

Sam shifted uncomfortably. "Listen, I gotta head off, my folks are expecting me home." She flipped up the kickstand of her bike. "Let me know when that idiot ghost finally gets back to you, I'm going to give him a piece of my mind for making us wait out in the cold like this." She gave the two boys a snarky grin and peddled down the street.

She was glad to feel the wind rush by, more than willing to focus on traffic to keep her mind off their missing friend. Above her the clouds were rushing by as the wind picked up, and she was thankful it hadn't started raining while she rode. More than once she'd been caught in bad weather riding through town. Her parents kept insisting she let the family's chauffer drop her off at school but 1) _that would be a total waste of fossil fuels mom_ and 2) she didn't exactly want to announce her family's wealth by being dropped off by her own personal driver.

And now with the addition of Phantom to her friend group she had a third reason: walking to and from school allowed them all to hang out and joke around together. Before she knew it she had started to treasure those moments, and the otherworldly boy had become one of the gang.

Sam pulled up to the Manson estate and swung her bike behind the house to the garage. She hoped more than anything that Phantom was alright.


End file.
